Red Hat's next Linux due before March

Red Hat plans to ship the next version of its premium Linux product on February 28, debuting major virtualization technology but missing an earlier deadline by about two months.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 had been scheduled to ship by the end of 2006. However, the company began giving itself scheduling wiggle room in September, when Red Hat released the first RHEL 5 beta. A second beta arrived in November.

Now Red Hat is being more definitive. "I'm sure we will ship a gold (version) on February 28," Chief Executive Matthew Szulik, referring to the final version, said in an interview after the company reported its quarterly financial results.